Blair Ignored Iraq War Legal Advice

By

Associated Press

Jan. 18, 2011 5:34 a.m. ET

LONDON—Britain's former top legal official says Tony Blair insisted the U.K. could join the 2003 invasion of Iraq without additional backing from the U.N., despite legal advice which told him that was untrue.

Lord Goldsmith, the attorney general between 2001 and 2007, told the country's inquiry into the Iraq war that he was uncomfortable with the then-prime minister's claim that a U.N. resolution specifically authorizing the U.S.-led...